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Ukrainians Demand Return of Communists

Angered over unpaid wages and pensions, tens of thousands of people across Ukraine marched today to demand a return to Communist rule.

Interior Minister Yuri Kravchenko was quoted by the Interfax-Ukraine news agency as saying that as many as 85,000 people had taken part in the demonstrations, which were called by left-wing groups.

''Wages! Wages!'' chanted a crowd of about 3,000 mostly elderly people as they marched under a red flag past Parliament and the main government building in Kiev.

The crowd carried an effigy of a businessman hanging upside down with American dollars falling from his pockets, an expression of resentment against the new dollar-rich class that has emerged since independence in 1991.

Some 5,000 Communist supporters demonstrated in Dnipropetrovsk, an eastern industrial city that is Mr. Kuchma's hometown. A crowd of about 3,500 gathered in the southern Crimean city of Simferopol, chanting ''Power to the Communists!'' And some 7,000 protesters rallied in Donetsk, center of the eastern coal region.